Afghan Christian Released From Jail

A top Afghan official says Abdul Rahman, arrested last month for converting from Islam to Christianity – a capital offense - has been released from jail. He still faces death threats from angry Muslims and his current whereabouts are a secret.

Word of Rahman's release from the high-security Policharki prison on the outskirts of Kabul late Monday night came early Tuesday from Deputy Attorney General Mohammed Eshak Aloko.

"We issued a letter saying he was mentally unfit to stand trial, so he has been released... I don't know where he is now," said Aloko, who says Rahman, 41, was freed on the orders of prosecutors, and his family was there when he was released.

Monday, Rahman – who at that time expected to be let go, following Sunday's court decision to drop the charges against him – appealed to the United Nations for help in finding a country to grant him asylum.

U.N. spokesman Adrian Edwards said at that time that the world body was working with the Afghan government to help Rahman and expected asylum would "be provided by one of the countries interested in a peaceful solution to this case."

Court dismissal of the charges against Rahman came after heavy international pressure, including from the U.S. and the Vatican.

About 700 people chanting "Death to Bush" and other anti-Western slogans protested Monday against the decision in Mazar-e-Sharif, Afghanistan. Police commander Nasruddin Hamdrad says security forces surrounded the demonstrators but did not intervene.

A Supreme Court spokesman, Abdul Wakil Omeri, said the case was dismissed because of "problems with the prosecutors' evidence." He said several of Rahman's relatives testified he is mentally unstable and prosecutors have to "decide if he is mentally fit to stand trial."

CBS News correspondent Sheila MacVicar quotes one investigator as saying the testimony included a statement from Rahman's daughter, saying that he has mental problems.

The assertion that Rahman has mental problems, reports MacVicar, appears to be the basis of a face-saving deal in which he may be declared incompetent and unfit to answer for his actions, released and most likely, flown out of the country.

An Afghan official closely involved with the case told The Associated Press that the court ruled there was insufficient evidence and returned the case to prosecutors for further investigation. But he said Rahman would be released in the meantime.

"The court dismissed today the case against Abdul Rahman for a lack of information and a lot of legal gaps in the case," the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to publicly comment on the case.

Rahman, 41, became a Christian in the 1990s while working for an aid group in neighboring Pakistan.

Muslim extremists have demanded death for Rahman because he has turned away from Islam. Some clerics vowed that they would incite Afghans to kill Rahman if he was let go.

The case sparked an outcry in the United States and other nations that helped oust the Taliban regime - a government ruled by fundamentalist Islamic clerics insistent that all Aghanis follow their interpretations of Islam to the letter - in late 2001 and provide aid and military support for Afghan President Hamid Karzai. President Bush and others insisted Afghanistan protect personal beliefs.

Rahman was held in solitary confinement in a tiny concrete cell next to a senior prison guard's office and authorities have barred journalists from seeing him.

A senior guard said inmates and many guards were not told of Rahman's identity because of fears they might attack him.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, speaking Sunday on CNN's "Late Edition," said the U.S. government had stressed to Karzai that religious freedom is a vital element of democracy.

"We're going to stand firm for the principle that religious freedom and freedom of religious conscience need to be upheld," said Rice.

The uproar left Karzai in an awkward position. While trying to address concerns of foreign supporters, he also has sought not to alienate religious conservatives who wield considerable influence in Afghanistan.

In an interview published Sunday by an Italian newspaper, Rahman said it was his family, including his former wife and two teenage daughters, who reported him to authorities.

He stressed that he was fully aware of his choice to convert.

"If I must die, I will die," Rahman told the Rome daily La Republica, which did not interview him directly but channeled questions through a human rights worker who visited him in prison.

Rahman said he chose to become a Christian "in small steps" after leaving Afghanistan around 1990. He moved to Peshawar, Pakistan, then to Germany and tried to get a visa in Belgium.

"In Peshawar, I worked for a humanitarian organization. They were Catholics," Rahman said. "I started talking to them about religion, I read the Bible, it opened my heart and my mind."

After saying he was ready to die, he told La Republica: "Somebody, a long time ago, did it for all of us," in a clear reference to Jesus Christ.